


Lizzie's Fugue

by IJM



Category: General Hospital
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-26
Updated: 2020-08-26
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:14:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26114752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IJM/pseuds/IJM
Relationships: Franco and Elizabeth Baldwin
Comments: 5
Kudos: 11





	Lizzie's Fugue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Akasha1897](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akasha1897/gifts).



_Present:_

“Mind if I smoke?” Elizabeth Webber-Baldwin asked Kevin Collins. She reached in her purse for her cigarettes.

“As a matter of fact, I do, and so does the hospital. There’s a no smoking policy.”

Elizabeth sighed with frustration, dropping the package back into her bag. She stood and wandered around Kevin’s office, lazily investigating a knick-knack or two. She sighed heavily. “Why am I here?”

“Your family and friends are concerned about you, Elizabeth.”

She frowned. “I’m fine. So, what. I ran away from home for a hot minute. I can’t be the first new mom to be overwhelmed.”

_A week prior:_

“I’m all in!” Lizzie exclaimed, shoving all her chips to the center of the table. Smoke filled the air around her, settling on her clothes and in her hair. There was a consistent cacophony of dinging, ringing, and computerized cheering that filled the already sullied atmosphere.

Lizzie wore tight jeans, a white shirt, and a red leather jacket. No one would have guessed that she had given birth just a few days ago. She lit up a cigarette and took a shot of tequila, feeling much bigger than her tiny frame would suggest.

“And it’s a bust,” the dealer said, using a curved cane to gather all the chips to himself.

“What?” Lizzie exclaimed. “That can’t be right. I’m on roll.”

“You just rolled off the cliff, Little Lady,” a pudgy, mustached man teased. He set his cocktail glass onto the table with a haughty laugh.

“This is unacceptable,” Lizzie argued. “I demand to see the tapes.”

The dealer laughed. “Only the managers can demand to see the tapes.”

“Then I demand to see a manager.”

“Look, you lost. Get over it and get into the next game or get lost.”

_Present:_

“Is that how you feel? Overwhelmed?”

She shrugged. “Look, I guess I thought I was done having kids after my third boy. _The girl_ was a surprise.”

“Do you regret—”

“Not at all!” Elizabeth interrupted her therapist. “I just—”

Kevin waited while Elizabeth paused.

“I just realized that this really is my last child. Like just now. This minute.”

“How does that make you feel?”

_Six days prior…_

“I was so worried about you!” Franco Baldwin exclaimed, seeing his wife through cell bars. The most unusual thing about this situation was who was on which side of the bars.

Elizabeth disappeared just days after giving birth to their daughter. She was an adult; there were no signs of foul play; and there was no note regarding her intentions. It was an understatement to say Franco was shocked when Harrison Chase called him and told him that Elizabeth had been arrested in Atlantic City for assault, public intoxication, and disturbing the peace at a casino… Franco wondered just how exactly a one hundred pound woman who had just given birth could disturb the peace _at a casino. In New Jersey._ He was grateful she had been arrested though. Otherwise she might have disappeared for much longer.

_A week prior…_

“Get me a manager!” Lizzie yelled at the dealer.

“Security!” the dealer called, not withstanding the nonsense of another in a long string of sore losers.

A large man in a blue uniform approached Lizzie. “You need to move along, ma’am.”

“Don’t. Call. Me. M _a’am_!” Lizzie socked the security guard right in his jaw, nearly breaking her own hand.

The next thing Lizzie knew, two even larger men were attempting to subdue her while she clawed and kicked and screamed. Then she was stuffed into the back of a patrol car in handcuffs.

Lizzie was irate, screaming obscenities at anyone within earshot while she was taken to booking and thrown into a holding cell waiting for her arraignment.

Lizzie was in trouble now.

_Six days prior…_

“Look, sweetheart, we’re going to get you out of here,” Scotty Baldwin told his daughter-in-law.

Franco was disturbed by the way Elizabeth was acting, or more specifically, by the way she was not acting. She had not even acknowledged the tiny baby girl who was squirming in her father’s arms.

Scotty, on the other hand, took note of the lack of interaction. He would make the best of it to get Elizabeth out of the charges she was facing.

“I brought Katherine Imogene,” Franco said, hoping Elizabeth would notice her daughter. “We’ve all missed you.”

_Present:_

“Really?” Elizabeth sassed at the most generic question a therapist could ask. “How do I feel about that?”

“Well?” Kevin didn’t take it personally.

“I don’t know. I think it makes me feel old.”

“But you’re not old.”

“I’m not young either.”

“I should be a better mother than this,” Elizabeth whispered, a tear coming to her eye. “I can’t believe I did this.”

“Like you said, you were overwhelmed.”

“But why?” Elizabeth asked.

“That’s what I want to help you find out.” Kevin told her.

_Five days prior…_

“Elizabeth Imogene Baldwin, you’ve been charged with assault, public intoxication, and disturbing the peace. How do you plead?”

“Not guilty by reason of mental defect,” Scotty told the judge.

“Mental defect?” The judge repeated. “Would you like to explain your plea, Counselor?”

“Mrs. Baldwin gave birth just nine days ago, Your Honor. She disappeared the day after she and her husband brought the baby home. I have written statements from Britt Westbourne, her OBGYN, and Kevin Collins, her psychiatrist, citing post-partum depression leading to a leading to a dissociative fugue state. Just ask my client to state her name, your honor.”

“I’ll play along… Please state your name,” he directed at Elizabeth.

“Lizzie Webber,” Elizabeth told him, rolling her eyes.

“My client hasn’t gone by the name Lizzie Webber since she was a teenage girl,” Scotty told the judge. “Her behavior is completely out of the norm for Elizabeth Baldwin. Elizabeth is a responsible, dependable, hard-working nurse and a devoted wife and mother.”

_Present…_

“Maybe I’m not a devoted wife and mother,” Elizabeth admitted to Kevin. “Maybe Scotty was wrong about me. Maybe I’m a failure as a mother. I’m a failure as a daughter and as a nurse. I’m just a failure,” Elizabeth burst into tears.

Kevin passed her a box of tissues and let her cry out her proclamations of failure.

“I don’t know what to do,” she admitted. “I don’t know how to handle this,” she sobbed.

“What don’t you know how to handle?” Kevin prodded.

“Having a daughter.”

Kevin was surprised by her answer. “Can you explain why having a daughter is such a challenge.” She had already proven herself a splendid mother to her boys.

“I don’t want Franco to leave me.”

“Franco loves you and he adores that baby. Why would he leave you?”

“That’s what fathers do. I don’t want to lose him like I’ve lost everyone else. I don’t want Katherine Imogine to lose him. No one stuck around for my boys. Their fathers don’t make them a priority.”

“Have you expressed this to your husband?”

“Of course not,” Elizabeth answered. “He already thinks I’m crazy.”

_Four days prior…_

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” Franco told Elizabeth in a soothing voice meant for the baby as much as his wife. “You’re going to be okay. We all are.” They were waiting outside Britt’s office. The baby was due for her first checkup and Elizabeth was going to be examined as well.

Franco adjusted the baby against his shoulder, holding her tightly as he had done most of the first week and a half of her life. “Do you want to hold Kitty?”

“Kitty?” Elizabeth repeated. “You’re calling our daughter _Kitty_?”

“Aiden called her Kitty first because she likes to sleep and snuggle. It just stuck.”

“I guess I would know that if I’d been there,” Elizabeth snapped. She regretted it immediately. She didn’t mean to snap at her husband. She didn’t mean to use a sharp tone around her daughter. And she thought _Kitty_ was a cute nickname too. For some reason what she wanted to say and do around the baby never came out quite right. Franco asked if she wanted to hold the baby and she did… but she couldn’t.

Franco handled Elizabeth’s disappearance the only way he could. He had to put the baby’s needs first and rely on the PCPD to find his wife. He frequently assured the boys that their mother would come home soon, and he paid attention to Kitty’s every breath.

He had experienced an intense submersion into fatherhood, changing every diaper, making every bottle of formula, and all the while taking care of the three boys’ needs as best as he could. He had a newfound respect of Elizabeth and mothers in general. He also was grateful that General Hospital offered paternity leave.

Elizabeth glanced at her husband holding the baby, but she wouldn’t make eye contact with him or let her eyes linger on her daughter. She just couldn’t bear the sight of the child.

_Present:_

Elizabeth looked up as Kevin let Franco into his office. He still had that baby with him, like she was attached to him or something. Franco took the unoccupied chair in front of Kevin’s desk. “Hi,” he said to his wife, his hands full with the baby and her bag of necessities which became more and more full as Franco realized just how needy babies were.

“Do you love her?” Elizabeth asked her husband before Kevin was able to speak.

“More than I even imagined was possible,” he answered, kissing the baby’s forehead gently.

“Then don’t leave her,” Elizabeth told him, her voice as small as she herself felt.

“I would never leave her,” Franco told Elizabeth, completely surprised by her request. “I would never leave you or the boys either.”

“Everyone else left—Zander, Jason, Lucky. And you left too,” Elizabeth responded, thinking of how he disappeared for months when he had Drew’s memories. She knew he had only left to save Cameron, but when it came down to the brass tacks, he had left her just like every other man in her life.

“Baby, I—I—” he was unsure how to respond. He had been in a next to impossible situation. He didn’t want to give up his life with Elizabeth, but he could never have clung to his own life and identity at the expense of Cameron’s.

“I know!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “I know you did what you had to do. But I don’t want you to leave me and I don’t want you to leave her. How do I even know you love her? What if she’s not good enough because she’s a girl? What if you wanted a son of your own, someone to carry on the family name and all that?”

“Carry on the family name?” Franco repeated. That seemed an almost antiquated idea. “She can be a Baldwin her whole life if she wants to. Or she can take her spouse’s name one day like you did. Or she may not even get married. Her future is limitless.”

“Elizabeth, why do you fear Franco leaving you and the kids?”

She shrugged. “He’s a man.”

“I take offense at that!” Franco countered. “Wait… you know what I mean. I’m not like anyone else you’ve ever been with. And I’m not Jeff Webber.”

Elizabeth cringed at her father’s name.

“Jeff Webber,” Kevin repeated. That was a name he had not heard in a while. “The first man to abandon you.”

Elizabeth said nothing. She spent decades trying to pretend that she was just fine, that it didn’t bother her anymore that her father was the original deadbeat.

“What would you say to Jeff Webber if he was standing in front of you?” Kevin asked Elizabeth who shrugged.

“What would _you_ say to Jeff Webber?” Kevin turned the question over to Franco.

Franco took a breath, thinking about his answer. “I would say ‘You’re an idiot. You’re a stupid jerk for abandoning your daughter. But you know what? It’s your loss because Elizabeth is the best person in the world, and you don’t get to claim anything to do with her success in life.’”

“Success?” Elizabeth asked. “What success?”

“Your life,” Franco answered.

“My life has been a train wreck. One failed relationship after another. I couldn’t make anyone stay with me.”

“You can’t get rid of me,” Franco offered. “And it doesn’t matter that Lucky, Jason, Ric, or anyone else didn’t realize what a treasure you are. They were just pitstops on your way to happiness. If you got knocked down nine times, you got up ten. That makes you a success.”

“You don’t see your life as a success…” Kevin let the question linger.

Elizabeth caught her breath. “Um, no. I don’t. I’m getting by. I don’t know that I can be what Kitty needs or what Franco and the boys need. I mean, look at me. I just left my newborn to go gambling and get arrested. What kind of mom does that?”

“One with a chemical imbalance,” Kevin offered.

Elizabeth looked down, ashamed of her weakness. She was a nurse. She knew better. She was not the first or last woman to have a depressive episode or even a dissociative episode after giving birth. It wasn’t what anyone aspired to, but it wasn’t preventable either.

“What _would_ you say to Jeff?” Franco asked, curious.

“I don’t think I’d say anything,” Elizabeth shrugged. “I used to pretend I was telling him off, letting him have it with both barrels. But now… there’s nothing. I have nothing to say to the man. It’s not that I’ve forgiven him. I’ve just moved past the rage I used to feel. He’s… he’s not worth my words.”

“You should tell him that,” Franco told her. “He should know he’s not even worth a few words.”

“Maybe,” Elizabeth agreed. “Franco, please don’t ever do that to Kitty.”

“I could never. I love Kitty and I love her Mama and I love her brothers too much.”

Elizabeth smiled feebly while wiping a tear from her cheek.

“Kitty sure would like for her Mama to hold her,” Franco said softly, nodding toward the sleeping child in his arms.

Elizabeth hesitated just a moment, then put her arms out to take the child who woke. She took Kitty into her arms and smiled when she saw her scrunchy pink face with her dark blue eyes. She had a head full of dark hair. Her lips were like a little valentine. “She’s beautiful,” Elizabeth gasped. “She’s so perfect.”

“She looks just like you.” Franco told her, relieved that Elizabeth was smitten with the child.

“Yeah, she kind of does,” Elizabeth agreed with a laugh. “My poor little girl. I can’t believe I missed your first few days at home. Will you ever forgive me?”

Elizabeth looked up, meeting her husband’s eyes. “Will _you_ ever forgive me?”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” he shrugged. “Maybe we could go home and spoil this little girl?”

“I’d like that,” Elizabeth agreed. “Let’s take her home.”

–End


End file.
